When Rick Wagoner, the chairman and CEO of General Motors, walked onto the stage at the 2007 Detroit Auto Show to introduce what has become the 2011 Chevrolet Volt, he might as well have said that GM was going to build a flying car.

Sure, it’s a cool idea to have an electric vehicle (EV) that has the ability to drive 40 miles on power from a lithium-ion battery pack, recharge its batteries on the go from a small gasoline engine for a total cruising range of 400 miles, and then plug into the electric power grid at night for a complete recharge. But it sounds like another one of GM’s pronouncements of its intention to remake the American industrial landscape, something it does with comical frequency. Remember the 1960 Chevy Corvair, 1971 Chevy Vega, 1976 Chevy Chevette, 1985 Chevy Nova and 1990 Saturn S1?

And what has come of it all? Did you see any flying cars on the way to work today?

It makes you wonder about the chances that GM will come through with the 2011 Chevy Volt with its E-Flex electric powertrain. After all, haven’t we been through this before with the 1996 GM EV1?

Who Killed the Electric Car? You Did
Most people view the GM EV1 as a dismal failure. Viewed from strictly a marketing perspective, they are right.

The auto industry’s first (and so far only) modern, purpose-built, battery-powered electric car for the wide-open American highway was an absolute technology triumph, the most practical, energy-efficient four-wheeled vehicle ever to roll down the road. Even so, fewer than 1,000 EV1s were built between 1996 and 1999. Barely 800 were leased to customers before GM pulled the car’s (ahem) plug.

A response to the 1990 California zero emissions mandate, the EV1 had its beginnings in a surprise announcement in 1990 by the GM chairman (Roger Smith), a sound technological partnership (Hughes Electronics) and majestic promises of the future. (Sounds just like the Chevy Volt, doesn’t it?) And when the program ran out of juice in 1999, there were plenty of cynics who believed the whole billion-dollar exercise was intended to fail. It was supposed to quash the future of the electric car, conspiracy theorists argued…

Source: Edmunds.com